According to a report by the Telegraph, a UK court has ordered the Vatican to turn over confidential texts and emails between Italian Cardinal Pietro Parolin and Venezuelan Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, the top two officials in the Secretariat of State, despite claims from a Vatican official that doing so would constitute a “grave sin.” … Read more
The Vatican’s recognition is the latest sanation by Rome of a canonically illegal move by the Communist Party controlled Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, which has exerted increasingly unilateral control over episcopal appointments in the country, even since the signing of a 2018 deal between the Holy See and Beijing. That deal was meant to unify … Read more
The Vatican’s secretary of state has dismissed the claim that clergy sexual abuse is linked to homosexuality, labeling it a “serious and scientifically untenable association.” “Homosexual orientation cannot be considered as either cause or aspect typical of the abuser, even more so when it is decoupled from the general arrangement of the person,” wrote Italian … Read more
Just when you think that the Vatican’s “trial of the century” against a cardinal and nine other defendants for various alleged financial crimes can’t get any more surreal, two developments pop out of the woodwork to prove you wrong. A hearing Thursday produced both a previously unknown, and unauthorized, recording of a phone call with … Read more
Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin addressed the U.N. COP27 climate summit Tuesday, urging net-zero emissions and warning climate change “will not wait for us.” Speaking for Pope Francis, Cardinal Parolin told the dignitaries gathered in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Skeikh that the Holy See is fully committed to the goal of … Read more
The Vatican’s longtime investment banker testified Monday that he repeatedly voiced concerns about a fund that was investing in a troubled London property, but said the Holy See’s secretariat of state insisted on pursuing the deal even as it lost money. Enrico Crasso said he was very much on the sidelines of the London deal, … Read more
Pope Francis’ second-in-command, Cdl. Pietro Parolin, personally intervened to bar Cdl. Raymond Burke from entering Vatican offices over Burke’s conscientious objection to the abortion-tainted COVID-19 vaccine. Sources at the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints told Church Militant that Burke, a member of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, was recently stopped at … Read more
Responding to a query about his Dec. 23 ruling mandating vaccination for all Vatican employees and visitors who haven’t recently recovered from COVID-19, the Vatican secretary of state indicated religious exemptions are not ‘justified’ with respect to mRNA vaccines. Cardinal Pietro Parolin has said Vatican employees seeking to be exempt from the Vatican’s new vaccine … Read more
As COVID cases continue to rise in Italy due to the new Omicron variant, the Vatican on Thursday imposed a vaccine mandate, issuing a decree requiring all employees to possess a “Green Pass” proving vaccination against the coronavirus. This follows a previous decree from the Vatican in September requiring anyone entering Vatican City State to … Read more
Pope Francis last month made his first “appearance” at the ongoing Vatican trial over a London property deal that led to massive financial losses for the Holy See when his name came up in videotaped testimony of suspect-turned-star witness, Msgr. Alberto Perlasca. During the most recent hearing on Nov. 17, the recording showed Msgr. Perlasca, … Read more